Suhrid Barua has an unbridled passion for business and sports. He has worked/written for media houses like Thatscricket.com, The New Indian Express, MiD Day, Maharastra Herald (now Sakaal Times), Pune Mirror (Times of India's tabloid daily), CricketCountry, The Assam Tribune, The Telegraph and Sportskeeda. Watch out for this blog space for interviews, analysis, match coverage, stats figures and much more!

Thursday, February 27, 2014

Debutants Hockey
Gangpur- Odisha and Vidarbha Hockey Association launched their campaigns in the
‘B’ division of the 4th Hockey India Senior Men National Championship on a winning note at the Major Dhyan Chand Hockey Stadium in Lucknow on Thursday.

Vidarbha Hockey
Association kickstarted their campaign in Pool D, scripting a 2-1 win over
Delhi riding on a brace from Dalbir Singh.

In other matches, Bengal eased past Tripura
4-0 in Pool C. Chhattisgarh played out
a 1-1 draw against debutants Central Reserve Police Force in Pool D, while Maharashtra
spanked Kerala 8-0 in the same pool.

As many as 22 teams are
participating in the national ‘B’ division – the two-tier format being put in place
for the first time in the seniors nationals.

Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Defending champions
Haryana, last year’s runners-up Haryana, Punjab and Jharkhand are among thirty
two teams that will slug it out for top honours in the 4th Hockey
India Senior Women National Championship, which gets underway in Bhopal from
March 13. The senior nationals will run till March 23.

Like the men’s section,
the senior nationals for women from this year onwards will see a two-tier format – Division A and B. The
championship will be played at the Aish Bagh Hockey Stadium and Hockey Stadium
Mayur Park.

The event will be played on a league-cum-knockout basis and will be
played in two phases -- Division A and B. 16 teams will compete in both divisions.
The national ‘B’ division will be played from March 13-20, while the national
‘A’ division will be played from March 18-23.

Each division will comprise
four pools featuring four teams each. The tournament will witness the induction
of two new teams -- Vidarbha Hockey Association and Hockey Gangpur - Odisha. Assam will take on Goa
in the inaugural match of national ‘B’ Division on March 13 and the final match
of will be played on March 20. Haryana will face
Odisha in the inaugural match of national ‘A’ division on March 18 and the
final will be played on March 23.

It may be worth
recalling that Haryana got the better of Railways 4-1 in the 2013 final in
Lucknow, in a game where the latter squandered a mammoth 13 penalty corners.
Jharkhand had pipped Punjab to take the third spot.

The senior nationals
are of prime importance for women’s hockey players as the year 2014 is an
important year for them considering that the national team will be taking part
in big-ticket events like Champions Challenge 1, Commonwealth Games and Asian
Games.

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

The 2014 Sultan Azlan Shah Cup hockey tournament has
been hit by a series of withdrawals. Pakistan has become the latest country to
cry out of the premier tourney of the Asian region, dealing a severe blow to Malaysian
Hockey Confederation – the organizers of the event.

It is learnt that Pakistan had earlier confirmed its
participation only to back out at the eleventh hour without citing any reason
for their pull-out. The organizers are left disappointed by the developments and
now intends to keep the event a six-team affair as it has little time left to
seek for a replacement. Sources say the Pakistan Hockey Federation (PHF)
communicated their withdrawal decision through an e-mail recently.

The 2014 Sultan Azlan Shah Cup will be held from
March 13-23 in Ipoh, featuring hosts Malaysia, Australia, Canada, China, South
Africa and South Korea. The late pull-out of Pakistan means the organizers will
now have to rejig the fixtures, which needs a FIH approval.

Pakistan are the third team to cry out of the 2014 Sultan
Azlan Shah Cup. India had earlier declined an invitation to play as they want
to focus on their 2014 World Cup preparations with their national camp around
the same time. France was the second team to pull out as they desired to play
in the Champions Challenge I in Kuantan instead and were replaced by South
Africa.

The organizers are also hard-pressed to alter the
duration of the tourney as most of the participating teams have already made
their travel plans. Quite clearly, Pakistan’s last minute pull-out have
hit the organizers of the 2014 Sultan Azlan Shah Cup hard.

This piece was published in Stick2hockey.com Hockey India seems to be lining up elaborate preparations for the
national team for the 2014 Rabobank Men’s World Cup to be held in The
Hague, the Netherlands from May 31 to June 15.

The national hockey body
has decided to send the national team on a nine-day trip to the
Netherlands, where the boys will train at the World Cup venue from April
11-19. India is expected to play five or six practice games against
some top sides besides a few games against club sides.“We will play the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany and probably
one or two games against club sides. I believe the trip will allow the
boys to know what to expect at the World Cup,” Hockey India’s High
Performance Manager Roelant Oltmans elaborates post Hockey India League
scenario said in an exclusive interview.Oltmans, who served as Uttar Pradesh Wizards coach in the
just-concluded 2nd Hero Hockey India League, said the Indian team will
reach The Hague well ahead of the commencement of the marquee event. “We
will leave on May 22, which will give us adequate time to acclimatize
to the conditions before the World Cup begins on May 31. We are going to
play a warm-up game against Ireland on May 25 and one more practice
game on May 28 or 29 for which our opponent is yet to be confirmed.
Reaching the World Cup venue early will stand us in good stead before we
launch our campaign against Belgium on May 31,” he added.
The celebrated Dutch coach has revealed that most of the players who
figured in the 2nd Hero Hockey India League are likely to give the
upcoming Senior Nationals to be held in Lucknow a miss. “Look, these
players have been constantly travelling, playing matches, sometimes
back-to-back games for nearly a month. Player burnout is the last thing
India needs. The Senior National ‘A’ division will start on March 10 a
day before the World Cup camp begins. So players are better off by being
fresh for the World Cup camp and since both the camp and the nationals
are happening around the same time, there is no way the boys can
participate in the nationals. It is prudent for these guys to take a
well-deserved break after a strenuous run in the HIL and stay in good
shape for the camp,” he explained.
The scheduling of the World Cup camp in the second week of March also
meant that India had no option but to pull out of the 2014 Sultan Azlan
Shah Cup, which is slated to be held in Ipoh from March 13-23. “We had
to focus on our World Cup preparations and it would have been unwise to
have featured in the 2014 Sultan Azlan Shah Cup as the dates of this
event are clashing with our World Cup camp,” he quipped.
The second phase of the World Cup camp will begin once the team returns
from the Netherlands and will run till the team leaves for the
Netherlands on May 22.
Oltmans, who as caretaker coach of the national team, shepherded the
boys to a runner-up finish in the 9th Asia Cup where they lost narrowly
to Korea in the final, in the process sealing a World Cup through the
Oceania World Cup quota, refrained from talking about identifying new
talents from the 2nd HIL. “I have seen some new talents from the 2nd
HIL, but don’t wish to go into the details for now. We will see a lot of
new faces during the Senior Nationals and hope to unearth talented guys
from the ‘A’ and ‘B’ divisions,” he concluded on an optimistic note.
The venue for the 2014 World Cup camp is yet to be decided.

Monday, February 24, 2014

In what could be more good news for Indian hockey
fans after the success of the recently-concluded 2nd Hero Hockey
India League, the International Hockey Federation (FIH) has inked an eight-year
broadcast deal with Star Sports. The long-term deal with Asia’s biggest sports
broadcaster means Star Sports will broadcast all FIH-conducted events starting
from 2015.

The deal ensures hockey fans can watch live action of premier events
like the World Cup, Champions Trophy, Hockey World League, Junior World Cup
among others. Significantly, the top-notch broadcaster will beam live action of
FIH-organised events across the globe save for Argentina where the world governing
body has an existing arrangement. Under the terms of the deal, Star Sports will also enjoy
internet, marketing and digital rights of all FIH-sanctioned events.

It may be worth recalling that FIH had a
long-standing association with Ten Sports. The world hockey body started its
association with Ten Sports in 2005 with a broadcast contract, which was
extended in November 2011 for another three years till 2014-end.

The 2014 Rabobank Men’s Hockey World Cup as well as the
2014 men’s and women’s Champions Trophy slated to be in Argentina (Mendoza) and
India (Bhubaneshwar) in November and December, will be the high-profile events
that Ten Sports will broadcast live this year before the broadcasting baton is
handed over to Star Sports from 2015.

With the 2nd
Hero Hockey India League carnival over, the focus will now shift to the
national team’s preparations for the 2014 Rabobank World Cup slated to be held
in The Haque, the Netherlands from May 31 to June 15. And Hockey India in a bid
to give the boys the best possible preparation has lined up a nine-day exposure
tour at the very venue where the big-ticket event will be held.

The Blueshirts will train
at Hague from April 11 to 19. The modalities of the tour have also been worked out
– the team will play around five-six games during their Dutch stint.

It is learnt that
Hockey India was keen to have such an exposure trip going and even withdrew
from the 2014 Sultan Azlan Shah Cup to be held in Ipoh, Malaysia from March 13-23. India are likely to
play top European teams like Netherlands, Belgium, Germany and one or two local
club teams during their nine-day tour.

It is believed that
Hockey India also wants to ensure that the boys stay fresh ahead of the World
Cup and not overworked preparation-wise – probably learning from their past
experience of having exhaustive preparations on the eve of the 2012 London
Olympics, where the country capped its worst-ever performance settling for an
ignominious wooden spoon.

The performance at the
London Olympics had raised uncomfortable questions about whether the team was a
‘jaded’ lot after a gruelling European tour.